1. Field
The disclosed embodiments generally relate to a packet-processing technique for communications networks. More specifically, the disclosed embodiments relate to the design of a packet-processing network which is based on a virtual-port network switch fabric.
2. Related Art
In high-performance systems, a network or input/output (I/O) switch fabric typically plays an important role in traffic movement between servers. For example, with servers running multiple virtual machines (VMs) and many virtualized applications, network-packet streams coming out of a server often include an aggregation of different services that are needed by each of the VMs and their applications.
Within this aggregated network pipe, individual network-packet streams (representing different applications) tend to have different requirements. Moreover, at times these requirements may be in conflict with each other. For example, one network-packet stream may be latency-sensitive, while another network-packet stream may be latency-tolerant, but may need more services, such as routing or deeper packet inspection. Furthermore, some applications may require a low-latency response for communication, while other applications may be throughput-sensitive, but may be latency-tolerant. Consequently, it can be difficult to maintain the quality of service at the application level throughout the network switch fabric when multiple applications communicate across servers using existing network switch fabrics.
Hence, what is needed is a network switch fabric that facilitates communication of network-packet streams without the problems described above.